Trapped
by The Background Traveler
Summary: To go to a concert you need a car. To drive a car you need gas. To get gas you need money. To get money, you have to babysit, at least Max does. But a normal night turns into a horror when you add the worst hurricane North America has ever seen. AH AU FAX


**Hey, I'm Jess. Some might know me as J from a few years ago, with a screen name of faxlover27 or HaLf CrAzY hAlF dArK aLl JeSs. I deleted all previous stories I had on my account, hoping to start fresh. If you remember me, review, and if you don't, REVIEW! So, without further ado, I present my first story in two years: Trapped.**

The clock on a Friday knows it is the only thing preventing students from immersing themselves in their varying weekend activities. As it understands this fact, it feels the need to tick and tock and tick once more ever so slowly throughout the six and a half hours adolescents are imprisoned in different classes. Even the teachers want to climb a ladder and nonchalantly spin the dragging hour hand to the specified position that shares its minute with the final bell.

Max, with all the others, was looking at the clock. Thankfully, though it was the one period where the teacher – ancient, cross Mrs. Williams – expected her class' attention, the time piece was strategically placed directly above the old fashioned blackboard, as to give the teenagers a foolproof method of zoning out, for the second hand can actually be quite soothing after a while.

Eyes glazed, head propped on one fist, the other clutching a lazily doodling pencil tracing atop the sparse untouched spaces of a relatively new navy blue spiral notebook, Max was not just staring into thin air. Her mind was taking over the energy originally intended for her sight, pondering her plans for the two days relished by every person on Earth.

This evening she was to babysit, the only job still available to rack up gas money. All other employers catering to the needs of teens had their time slots bursting with virtually every high school-er of employment age. The cash for a few hours of chasing terrorizing munchkins was barely enough to fill up a tank for the dinosaur Max's parents bought for her sixteenth birthday, but it was better than nothing. She needed only a few gallons this Saturday, enough to get to and from a concert in the city. To Max's relief, the kids for whom she would be caring for were her favorites; Angel and Luke 'Gazzy' Butler, two well behaved, adorable children of eight and ten. Old enough to not need too much help with things like eating and going to the bathroom, and still young enough not to question why they needed a babysitter.

On Saturday, as previously mentioned, Max had plans to go to a concert in the nearby city, about thirty minutes away. It was for a lineup of several hard rock bands, promising her ringing ears for a few days and an excuse to not hear her name called from throughout the house. She would be attending with her boyfriend, Nicholas (Fang), who had jokingly said he was only coming to protect her from horny stoners guaranteed to be lingering on the edges of the standing crowd of which Max intended to push and hove her way to the front, but Max knew he loved the final band just as much as she. They often had it playing in the background of their study dates turned make out sessions.

On Sunday she would be doing something she had no choice in. Her year younger sister, Ella, Ella's best friend Monique (Nudge), and Nudge's on-again off-again boyfriend Iggy, who just so happened to be Fang's twin, had decided that Max's wardrobe was much to sophmore-ish for a junior – along with much to boyish for a girl – and would fix this horrendous tragedy by forcing Max to join them for a day at the mall. Max was not looking forward to Sunday.

She was looking forward to freedom, which is what the last bell finally granted her, along with a rude interruption to her train of thought, and a most ungraceful jolt of surprise that resulted in her many books required for AP English to be unceremoniously dumped onto the floor and become an obstacle for the many students rushing through the aisle between the seats, preventing Max from retrieving the dropped items until the stampede had lessened. When she glanced down after most had made it into the hallway flooded with weekend-hunting kids, she saw something that made her smile.

Fang, always the gentleman, was crouched down stacking her miscellaneous notebooks and textbooks in a rather large pile.

"I could've gotten them myself." She grinned, he never would let her do something as menial as picking up her books.

Fang returned her expression with his signature half smirk. "Consider it payment for the ride home."

"Who said you get a ride home?" Amusement laced her words.

"My lips." And with that, he connected the aforementioned body part to her own in a quick kiss, which soon grew into many.

"Want to babysit with me?" Max inquired, after a few minutes of bliss.

Fang raised an eyebrow. "Babysit who?" The Jensons were okay, as he had met them a few times after agreeing to babysit with Max. The Smiths were by far his least favorite; babies and toddlers galore who loved screaming and crying and pooping to their hearts content, with parents who gave less payment to a couple found making out on their couch with all the kids in bed.

"The Butlers."

Fang nodded, getting another smile from Max. Angel and Gazzy liked him, well, not so much him as his reading voice. He would be the one to deliver the bedtime story to those two, and would have different voices for each character. Eventually his deep, soft words would lull them into dreamland. They were also the adopted siblings of his twin's girlfriend, so they knew him better than the others he had looked after with his own partner.

"Then we need to get going, it's supposed to storm soon, and I need to be there by four to get enough money for gas. I'm running low so we need some more if we want to get to that concert tomorrow with out breaking down and having to walk."

The couple stood and grabbed their bags, walking through the now deserted hallways toward the front doors.

"Why do you always park so far away from the school?" Fang asked, as the made their way to the far end of the parking lot. He knew the answer, of course, but just loved her playful tone she used when explaining it to him.

"Far spots cost less you idiot, now come on, get the lead out of your pants." Another smile.

"Only you would use a quote from Newsies." She stuck her tongue out at him. "And someone's in a good mood."

"And someone's a chatty Cathy." Max replied, regarding his unnatural wordiness on that Friday afternoon. "Plus, I have evry right to be. It's going to storm, which I love. I'm babysitting my favorite kids, with you no less, school's out, and we get to go to the concert of a lifetime tomorrow." She grinned again, sighing with her now justified contentment.

He reached for her hand, linking their fingers, and the two made their way to a beaten down car on the far end of the school parking lot, black clouds darkening the sky.

**There you have it, my first story in years. I'm a bit rusty, and just started high school, so it might take a while to update. Just remember: reviewing makes me faster.**


End file.
